Hermit in the Mountains

Gu Changsheng stood barefoot on a large rock atop the mountain, his hands tucked into his sleeves. The bright sunlight shone on him, casting his shadow on the rock as a circular shape.

A gentle breeze swept across the hillside, causing Gu Changsheng's long hair and clothes to sway and dance in the wind.

His gaze was like that of a thousand-mile eye, clearly discerning the number of branches on the saplings on the mountaintop, the material of the wooden houses halfway up the mountain, the texture of the bamboo joints, and the varieties of vegetables.

With a twitch of the ears, the faint sound of flowing stream at the foot of the mountain reached them, followed by the footsteps of a blue ox a few hundred meters away.

This is the ability to have sharp ears and eyes that comes with improved cultivation.

He had a thought that perhaps others could cultivate the "Dao Seed Method" and enter the Dao Seed Realm, but they wouldn't experience the same supernatural abilities as him. However, they should have abilities such as physical tempering, improved hearing and vision, and enhanced perception.

He put aside all thoughts and stood quietly on the mountaintop, enjoying the cool breeze, the warmth of the sun, listening to the chirping of insects and birds, the sound of flowing streams, and admiring the clouds in the sky, the winding streams, the towering peaks, and the endless Qinling Mountains.

Gu Changsheng seemed to transform into a pine tree rooted to the mountaintop, his body remaining perfectly still. His shadow on the stone slowly moved eastward, gradually revealing a human-shaped outline.

Before we knew it, the sun had moved to the west, its half-round face hiding behind the mountain, bathed in golden afterglow, as if waving goodbye to the earth.

"The sun is almost setting; time really flies!"

A sigh echoed from the mountaintop, the voices carrying a sense of感慨 (gǎnkǎi, a feeling of deep emotion or reflection) about the passage of time.

Gu Changsheng stood on the mountaintop for six or seven hours without realizing it, his gaze fixed on the afterglow of the setting sun in the west.

"Sunrise and sunset, moonrise and moonset, sunrise and moonset, sunset and moonrise."

"Just like trees that wither and flourish, they all follow the cyclical order of reincarnation."

"Only time, like a galloping wild horse, is unrestrained and has no reins to slow it down."

After leaving behind a few words of reflection, Gu Changsheng slowly walked towards the wooden house halfway down the mountain.

He returned to the living room of the cabin, sat cross-legged on the cushion, poured himself a glass of warm water, and reached for his phone from the wooden cabinet behind him.

Gu Changsheng turned on his phone, turned off airplane mode, and saw several missed calls with red number icons. He clicked on them to take a look.

I received calls from Zhang Yuanfu, Li Anlan, Zhang Dashan, and others, but calls from GG were unavoidable.

He didn't return the call; instead, he tapped into WeChat to check their messages.

Yang Dashan left a message saying that he plans to take his son Yang Xiaoshan up the mountain this Saturday.

Zhang Yuanfu left a message saying that all six members of the pill-tasting group were very interested in the small elixir and asked many times if there were any left, with two of them being the most enthusiastic.

Li Anlan left a message saying that he heard Mr. Gu went to Fushoutang, and three days later, two kinds of minor elixirs appeared there. (Conan.jpg)

Gu Changsheng replied "okay" to Yang Dashan on WeChat. As for Li Anlan, she had already taken the bait and was basically out of the running. He would keep her hanging for now.

He exited the WeChat interface and called Zhang Yuanfu back.

"Beep, beep, beep..."

The call was answered in less than three seconds.

"Hello, Master Gu." On the other end of the phone, Zhang Yuanfu had his phone with him the whole time. When he saw the caller ID "Master Gu," he immediately answered the call.

Inside the wooden cabin, Gu Changsheng took a sip of warm water, put down the glass, picked up the phone on the table, and brought it to his right ear.

"Elder Zhang, tell me about the attitude of the six people towards you after the Pill Tasting Conference, and about the person who deliberately inquired about the Lesser Spirit Pill."

"Okay, senior..." Zhang Yuanfu recounted the changes in the six people's attitudes, their inquiries, and their probing conversations to Gu Changsheng.

"Senior, the two old men, Shen Jingxu and Shi Yideng, are the most concerned. They even tried to find out what herbs gave my Little Spirit Pill its special medicinal taste."

As Zhang Yuanfu spoke, his heart pounded faster, and his face showed unease. He was both afraid of getting involved in the secrets that Gu Changsheng knew, and curious to know what that special medicinal flavor was.

After taking four small elixir pills, the warming sensation in his body became more frequent and lasted longer.

He was itching to try it. He could sense the special medicinal smell of the Little Elixir, which was the opportunity he had been dreaming of, and the catalyst for his health cultivation to enter a new realm.

He asked this question to verify some rumors with Gu Changsheng, to confirm whether Gu Changsheng was a cultivator.

He also received some rumors about cultivation through his own channels. It seemed that some people had achieved a sense of Qi through cultivation. Perhaps the warmth in his body was the sense of Qi.

Zhang Yuanfu lived to be seventy years old, and he encountered countless events and met countless people, but he still could not resist the temptation of immortality.

The six members of the Pill Refining Society inquired about information from him, but he was also trying to find out the secrets they possessed.

He was pretty sure that Shen Jingxu and Shi Yideng, those two old guys, had mastered real skills.

He also knew about Taoist internal alchemy and often studied the Taoist canon. The Zhang family's health cultivation exercises also belonged to the category of internal alchemy.

Combining the various rumors about cultivation, and considering Gu Changsheng's extraordinary temperament and alchemy skills, Zhang Yuanfu became certain that someone could truly cultivate.

He had no idea why he hadn't discovered it before; perhaps it was because he had only recently been able to cultivate.

He's just old, not an antique. He also watches TikTok and often comes across videos about "spiritual revival," especially the incredibly realistic cultivation scenes created by AI technology.

On Changsheng Peak, Gu Changsheng could hear Zhang Yuanfu's breathing becoming somewhat rapid on the phone, and a smile appeared on his lips.

Sure enough, no one can resist the temptation of seeking immortality and eternal life.

With Zhang Yuanfu's connections, he will eventually find out about the secrets of cultivation in the outside world.

He didn't mind telling Zhang Yuanfu the secret that spiritual energy existed in the world, after all, the other party was also someone he was observing.

When he first sensed the abundant vital energy within Zhang Yuanfu at Fushou Hall, he began to observe him, wanting to see if Zhang could cultivate 'Qi' in the city devoid of spirits.

The city was devoid of spiritual energy, and the conditions did not allow him to determine whether Zhang Yuanfu possessed an 'innate spiritual root'.

Subject 1: Yang Dashan, to observe whether his "innate spiritual root" will regenerate;

Subject 2: Yang Xiaoshan, observe whether his "innate spiritual root" grade will improve and the attribute of his spiritual root;

Observation subject three: Yang Qingshan, also to observe whether the grade of his "innate spiritual root" will improve and the attribute of his spiritual root;

Yang Qingshan and Yang Xiaoshan are used to compare whether the "innate spiritual root" will show different degrees of change at different ages.

Subject 4: Zhang Yuanfu. Observe whether he can cultivate "Qi" in the city of Jueling to verify the changes in the presentation of Neidan (internal alchemy) in different environments.

In a world of cultivation where spiritual energy is abundant, no one would care about these minor changes.

However, Blue Star is in the Dharma-ending Age, a world devoid of spiritual energy. Gu Changsheng guessed that the spiritual energy in the mountains had probably only recently appeared, and he didn't have a precise idea of ​​how long it would take for the spiritual energy to recover.

The earliest time for spiritual energy to recover can only be taken as the day of one's own accident.

After a moment of contemplation, Gu Changsheng made up his mind and decided to test his suspicions. He replied to Zhang Yuanfu with a message.

On the other end of the phone, Zhang Yuanfu smiled broadly upon hearing the conversation, repeatedly assuring everyone that he wouldn't be late.